Viability of the 5-Spec and Shadowzerker after 1.62

[trigali]

Patch 1.62 will bring a strong adjustment to the damage dealt by Left Axe styles.

Practically, in Midgard, this will affect Berzerkers and Shadowzerkers (and 5-spec, which is not far of the shadowzerk).

Mythic for the moment promised a single line respec in LA to enable to compensate for the 'nerf'.

My first impression is that the only viable spec line for the shadowblade (who is not - unlike the Berzerker - a 'light tank' class) will be the Critblade, if you take away his damage dealing ability from LA.

Therefore, all the points I have put in envenom (which are not subjected to respec) become a waste of my points.

Also, the Realm Ability choices that I have made were made to maximise my effectiveness in double-wielding. With my strength capped at something like 30, I become even more of a gimp than I was.

How do you see the Left Axe changes effecting your Shadowblade ?

 

[Old_Bean]

I can foresee a big market in respecc stones for Shadowzerkers...

 

[Cyradix]

I'm a shadowzerk so I'm build to do L axe damage

44 axe, 44 L axe, 35 stealth, 34 CS, 10 envenom.

Guess how happy I am....

 

[Xtro]

My 5 spec SB who already does crap damage imho, and is practically relegated to tailorbot status barring guild/alliance hunts will definitely be shelved. I'm not interested in playing a critblade.

I was recently torn between levelling a zerker or a warrior. As I was zerker on US, I chose warrior. Thank God!

 

[trigali]

Oh God <puts hand in his head and cries>

Not to mention all the money I have spend on 1h weapons... 3 full 99% sets...

There's going to be no-one to buy those back now, and I need to swap to very expensive 2handers.

ARRGHH !

I may well shelf Trigali as well. I don't have 4 platinum for a respec stone.

 

[Cyradix]

I bought 2 new 99% axes yesterday, about 20 min before the new patch notes went up

 

[mannschaft]

My fully SC'ed armour, pumped with proccs.....costed me a fortune, all based on 5 specc. Sod off Mythic lamers. Gimme ALL of my money back, i mean all of MY REAL MONEY i have wasted on being nerfed time after time, BAH!

 

[Solid]

#1 Its only a incremental Patch and has NOT gone live, fgs same day as they announced 1.62a they subsequently announced 1.62b to revert back their original change.

Don't people know that the best wat to test is to take to extremes and work back to a balanced state?

#2 I highly doubt Mythic are stypid enuff not to consider the implication of a change for a class thast on Hybrid weaponspec and doesnt take LA to highest specs and suffers from low Str.

Give them a chance to release the live patch before you start Doomsaying.

That said, I wouldnt mind an excuse to try a new SB variant spec I cooked up so I await the live patch as eagerly as the next man

Needless to say I have for now shelved the Zerker i was levelling in favor of a 2H savage

 

[Fafnir]

Originally posted by Solid
Needless to say I have for now shelved the Zerker i was levelling in favor of a 2H savage

Bah you copycat. I started a 2H Axe savage 2 weeks ago. Only lvl 6 atm :/

 

[[PS]Riddler]

Id like to say what Azal has to say

 

[Damon_D]

hehe Faf started a 2h axe sav the day I got SI.. but he is only lvl 16 now.. ffs I got to many alt's..

And on the SB part..yeah well if the patch end's up as is now..well ..Selling respecc stone anyone ????

 

[Azal]

Wait til it goes live, until then nothing is certain. If if is that bad i might try 50 sword 44 crit but tbh whats the point. Critblades suck with spellcrafting.

 

[svartalf]

"#2 I highly doubt Mythic are stypid enuff not to consider the implication of a change for a class thast on Hybrid weaponspec and doesnt take LA to highest specs and suffers from low Str."

Is this a joke? You honestly think Mythic AREN'T that dumb, after all this time?

 

[skar_ironfist]

I think that any changes that Mythic do, sometimes have implications beyond their initial scope. So I agree with Solid, lets wait and see what happens when they release the full patch.

Already they have lowered the conc points for the Shaman endurance regen.

Wait until see what the true situation is when you try your characters out with the changes in place.

 

[Maliz-]

Oh, single respecc. cool. then I can respec out of LA and have 50 axe, 50 parry and _alot_ of leftover points. nice spec, not.

Think mythic is hunting me, nerfing all the chars I roll... But still, its only a Pendragon patch, so nothing is sertain yet. Can only hope and pray, or I'll start playing Planetside with Xtro

 

[Makwaerk]

ya but now is the time to whine tbh... if the put it in the patch it is to late

 

[Solid]

tbh EU players are not i a position to "whine"

Let the US players log on Pend, and send in damage logs of live vs Pend and that is pretty much all they can do. Pend is PURELY for testing purposes, thats what Mythic EXPECT when stuff goes on Pend, for players to test stuff, and send feedback.

Loads and Loads of szerks/SB have sent pre/post damage logs in to Mythic and protested their case with hard numbers.

Anyone not bothered doing the testing and then whining is quite frankly a lazy shit who is jumping on a bandwagon.

Key points are TEST and PATCH and TEST SERVER...

Oh and whilst LA may not e as attractive to Shadowblades when the patch does go live, what the community should then be pushing for is boosts in other areas that Shadwblades specialise in.

namely poisons, I think a Dex/Qui poison is definately in order, considering SB cannot debuff 100% of Inf/NS weaponskill whereas they CAN debuff 100% of our weaponskill, namely we are 100% Str weaps.

Add to that SB dont have an option on weapontype to spec and also dont have an option for str/dex weapons either, these are areas that can, should and will get highlighted a LOT when the patch does eventually go live.

The otehr thing to address will be the 9sec stun of Dragonfang which even in its current guise is way too long a stun for such an eas to pull off style for an assasin.

FGS 9sec Stun off evade, NS or SB cant get anything like this easy and effective a style.

Add to the fact NS get Avoid Pain, a freaking PURE TANK RA that no Alb/Mid hybrid can even buy, wtf were Mythic thinking doing that? that will be anotehr area SB community will highlight, the piss poor RA choices of SB compare dto NS.

There is a bigger picture to look at than just the LA nerf and once you add ALL the issues together the SB will be the worst performing assasin of the lot if LA nerf does indeed stay as the current 35% it is on Pend. tbh 35% is a ludicrous nerf and no class has ever had such a big change in damage potential.

 

[Jaem]

Originally posted by Azal
Wait til it goes live, until then nothing is certain. If if is that bad i might try 50 sword 44 crit but tbh whats the point. Critblades suck with spellcrafting.

I've that spec roughly. never reach my cap of 970 on PA, usualy I hit how about 400, if I'm lucky.

then I hit for about 130 with a 5spd great dwarven sword at 99%.

I tend to use sword styles as the CS normal melee styles use alot of end with a slow 2hd. Mostly use 1hd, so I can rely on my procs going off on the two 1hd weapons.

I've tried using a shield and 1hd, blocks more then I expected, great for farming.

I don't know if theres any difference in speed using only 1x1hd over 2x1hd, anyone know?

 

[Wij]

Originally posted by Xtro
My 5 spec SB who already does crap damage imho, and is practically relegated to tailorbot status barring guild/alliance hunts will definitely be shelved. I'm not interested in playing a critblade.

I was recently torn between levelling a zerker or a warrior. As I was zerker on US, I chose warrior. Thank God!

Oooh - u still playing X ?

Might dig out my details

 

[Xtro]

lo m8

Not for much longer, Planetside retail release soon, beta is great fun!

 

[Mikal]

Originally posted by Cyradix
I'm a shadowzerk so I'm build to do L axe damage

44 axe, 44 L axe, 35 stealth, 34 CS, 10 envenom.

firstly that is not a shadowzerk, shadowzekers don't use PA and CD,
if I remember correctly that spec is called a soulblade (lowering envenom, to be able to do more damage with his weapon)

it's true, shadowzerks and 5-spec will probably be forced to respec to some form of critblade.

but look at it, we all know bezerkers (and those are the real reason for the LA nerf) were way more powerfull than the blademaster and mercenary, I mean way way more, more than you could justify by calling Midgard the melee realm

I do think though, that mythic are overdoing it, changing blademasters and mercenaries abilities so that it practically nullifies zerk mode, which already has it's drawback in form a major defence penalty

but fear not shadowblades, you can still use two weapons and CS styles and manage just fine, we already have some very succesfull shadowblades doing that, and who have done it for a long time.

 

[trigali]

Originally posted by Jaem

I don't know if theres any difference in speed using only 1x1hd over 2x1hd, anyone know?

There is, Jaem. If you use 2 weapons of different speeds, then your overall swing-speed is an average of those 2 speeds.

For example: you have a 3 sec sword and a 2sec axe, you will swing every 2.5 sec.

(made up figures, not taking into account dex, buffs etc.)

 

[Hendel_Torr]

Well my zerk is gonna have a respec out of LA and go 2 handed with 50 parry but why only give us a single line respec id rether have 2 handed hammer just seems like anothe mess up if it comes too...

 

[Solid]

IMO People are just being silly about LA.

Mythic will never nerf LA to the point where it does less damage than just using the standard weapon line styles.

This means 50LA 50 Weapon zerker will ALWAYS outdamage his/her 50 Weapon/50Parry sibling

The entire point of LA is to outdamage conventional weaponspecs at the expense of defence and Mythic simply will not go against this fundamental principle of duel wielders.

US tests show that a 50 LA Zerk is still doing at least 20% more damage than an equivalent classic weapon Zerk. Simply means if you want that massive hit during Zerk omde, swap to 2H before you swing. There is NO REASON to respec out of LA for a beserker.

The person who made this post, Xenogenic has done some superb testing on pendragon to outline the changes and where that leaves LA as far as damage potential goes on the current Pendragon Test Server.:

LA Damage Logs and summary

 

[Wij]

But does it mean Savage > Zerk now ?

 

[Solid]

I think it means unbuffed Classic Weap Savage >> Zerk
Unbuffed H2H Savage has way inferior weaponskill than a zerk, and if Shield/Parry fix is to be believed then Zerk has an advantage in that area.

Buffed LA Zerk still >> Savage due to the Style damage on LA styles which is still 20% >> than classic weapon styles.